Web Map Service (WMS) Support

The Web Map Service protocol has been around a while.  A long while.  I just got around to implementing it in WhirlyGlobe-Maply.

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Of course the toolkit has been able to do this sort of thing since 1.0, but with a variant of TMS.  I think.  You know, what OpenStreetMap and Google publish.  Bing does something weirder.

Anyway, you can do WMS now in your WhirlyGlobe or Maply app.

The Code

All this is in WhirlyGlobe-Maply 2.2, a rather massive update to the toolkit I'll be publishing shortly.  It's in the develop branch if you're feeling frisky.

Here's how you'd add the NAIP ortho quads to your globe (or map).

Pretty simple, actually.  Here's all we're doing.

• Create a coordinate system that describes good old WGS84 lat/lon.
• Setting up a tile source to point to the WMS end point.
• Starting a new layer which uses that tile source.

Incidentally, you can write your own tile sources now.  The code for MaplyWMSTileSource is pretty simple and it lives at the Component level.  That means it's entirely Objective-C.

Oh, and I don't think you should do this for WMS sources you don't own.  WMS is much more general and I'm using it for tiles, which is... yeah.  Anyway, be sure you know what services you're hitting and how they feel about it.

COM.Geo Talk - Monday July 22

I'm giving a short talk on WhirlyGlobe-Maply at the COM.Geo conference in San Jose on Monday.

It's a 10 minute overview of the toolkit, who uses it, what it's for and such.

Here are the slides.

StrataLogica 2.0

This is a beast of an app based on WhirlyGlobe.

Woo!  Topical!

They've got a free mode, so I suggest checking it out.

The 2.0 version just came out and it's a lot of new functionality and a whole new interface.  You can draw on the globe.  I kid you not.

They're going for schools here.  Teachers, students, geography, history, that sort of thing.

WhirlyGlobe

Of course it's all about me, so yes it's using WhirlyGlobe-Maply.  More WhirlyGlobe than Maply, for sure.  StrataLogic 1.0 was using WhirlyGlobe, but I never got around to posting about it.  Er, duh.

Anyway, without going into too much (any) detail on the inner workings, there are a lot of moving parts here.  The interface is entirely the product of a talented team at RoundArch Isobar.  The data sets are shared with the desktop version, which is based on Google Earth and owned by HerffJones-Nystrom.

I did the globe portion, as you might guess.  That may look like the big piece, but trust me, it ain't.  That interface is pretty deep.

WrapUp

These guys have been a client for the better part of a year and it's nice working with a team.  They've been willing to experiment and bring the necessary resources to bear.  I think the result speaks for itself.